Notting Hill - Lynn Hilton, 1995

I took this picture at Notting Hill Carnival in London in the mid 1990s. I’d spent the day getting various carnival pictures for the Mail on Sunday, and was just heading back to the car when I spotted this slightly incongruous sight.

Of course the letter hidden by the lady is an “n”, but it’s enough to make the viewer look more closely, and the way her hat and skirt pick out the colour of the graffiti makes it look as if she might have been involved in writing it, though I’m sure she didn’t.

I just like the incongruous juxtaposition of the elements in the shot, and the strong colours against the low-key backdrop. To me it’s a picture which says nothing in particular, yet seems to invite the viewer to decide what the story might be.

Lynn Hilton got her first staff position on the Oldham Evening Chronicle in 1983. In 1986 she moved to London to work for national newspapers and the Fleet Street News Agency, until getting a staff job on the Mail on Sunday in 1987, where she stayed until March 2006 when she went freelance.

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